


Regardless of Circumstance, The Animal Was Adopted

by Hypercamera3



Series: Completed Fic Requests [1]
Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Animal care, Mythical Creature, Other, Post-Canon, Some angst, controlling parents, half-bird half-rabbit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-17
Updated: 2019-06-17
Packaged: 2020-05-13 11:48:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,442
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19250593
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hypercamera3/pseuds/Hypercamera3
Summary: Pacifica finds a weird animal in the forest and decides to help it.





	Regardless of Circumstance, The Animal Was Adopted

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was based on a prompt from Icarus (https://archiveofourown.org/users/artmageddonwrites): Pacifica meets a cute animal.
> 
> This series takes place in the winter after the finale of Gravity Falls. Pacifica's parents have moved into a different mansion near Gravity Falls because there is no way they don't still rake in too much money, especially after selling their old mansion.

The wind moving through the mansion helped slam the door harder when Pacifica pushed it behind her. The sound of the front door shutting echoed throughout the foyer. From the adjacent room, Preston Northwest pulled his Rich Hunters magazine down and turned to the archway.

“Pacifica?” Preston announced.

Pacifica stopped dead in the middle of stomping the snow off her boots. “Um, yeah dad?”

Preston sniffed. “You smell like you’ve dragged the woods in here. The poor, penniless, non-money owning woods.”

“I went by the lumber yards!” Pacifica called back quickly. “To scoff at the tree cutters who have to work in the cold snow without industrial, gold burning heaters!”

Pacifica finally stepped into the archway between the main foyer and Preston’s sitting room. Snow still clung to the front of her bangs, and her hood had done a number on her hair. As the snow became water and dripped into her mascaraed eyes, she simply held her jacket tightly closed. She stared ahead at her father. Waiting for an order, a command, a ring of that bell.

“Well don’t linger in the foyer too long, we don’t need the smell of lower class at the front door.” He eyed her closely for another moment before lifting up his magazine. “Run along, now.”

“Thank you, Dad.” Pacifica breathed deeply. She’d barely noticed that her breath was held.

She rushed up the stairs and moved into her room. Shutting and locking the door, she got to her bed. She undid the buttons on her coat, and the small creature jumped free and landed on her bed.

It was a curious sort of creature you’d only find in Gravity Falls. A small brown rabbit that stopped being a rabbit just at the front shoulders, where it suddenly morphed into the body of a brown hawk. The creature stumbled for a moment on the bed. It chittered nervously, while Pacifica tried to slowly remove her jacket and wipe the snow from her hair. It took a step forward and attempted to spread its wings out before recoiling in pain and screeching out.

Pacifica got close to it and tried to keep it come with soft words, though it mostly amounted to her repeatedly chanting “please shut up, please shut up” to it in her kindest tone.

The copious amounts of pillows, furniture, and blankets helped dampen the sounds from the little creature. And, mercifully, it quieted down soon after. Within an hour it had taken to a corner, where Pacifica had created a nest out of blankets using the round, squishy cat bed she’d found in the attic. It would occasionally leave the nest to take objects from around the room and add to its little makeshift home. Pacifica’s hair brush, make-up brush, compact mirror, several hundred dollar money clips, necklaces, rings, and bracelets soon became part of this little creature’s home. It had also thrown the blanket over itself and continued to warily eye Pacifica as she made her way around the room.

 

* * *

 

_“Half-rabbit, half-hawk?”_ Dipper asked.

Pacifica switched the camera on the pearPad to the back camera and zoomed in close on the blankie cave. She could see Dipper squinting for a better look at the animal beneath.

“Here, watch.” Pacifica grabbed a tube of lipstick and rolled it across the floor to the animal. It came to a stop about a foot in front of the next.

It poked its little bunny head out, waiting for movement from Pacifica or another predator. Then, it launched out of the nest, grabbing the lipstick in its mouth and spread its wings as a challenge to any hunter, before limping back to the nest and putting the tube down on a makeshift wall.

“ _Oh,_ ” Dipper said. “ _I get it now_.”

“It’s wing is limp, I found it stumbling in the snow,” Pacifica said. She switched the camera to the front-facing one. “I don’t know how I’m supposed to help it.”

“ _I don’t have my book, but I’m texting Grunkle Ford right now_.” Dipper set his phone down and turned away, typing on his keyboard. “ _If anyone’ll know what to do here, it’s him._ ”  
  
Staring into the screen, she could see the blue sky and burning sunlight of Piedmont through Dipper’s window. The light still seemed to hint at perfect summer weather as it shone across the room. It sharply brought into focus every color as sudden, vibrant shades. Dipper’s trapper hat hung atop the bedpost, unworn because of the heat. She looked out her window to see the snow unceremoniously dumping across Gravity Falls. She yearned to be anywhere but here, in this house.  
  
She looked back at the small creature cowering and glaring at her from underneath the blankets. Tuning everything out, it was clear that whimpers and ragged breaths were the only thing it was producing at this point. Pacifica sighed.

“I just want to make the little… thing feel better.”

“ _A Northwest taking care of an animal, who’d’ve thunk it. Being poor really did a number on you.”_

“Hey! I am not poor, I’m just not _as_ rich. And besides, I had a pony!”

“ _That you took care of?_ ”

“That Enrique the stableboy took care of…”

“ _Mhm._ ” Dipper tapped a finger against his computer screen. “ _Ford says that it’s called a birbit. They’re omnivores, but the best thing for their health when injured is rest, water, carrots, and warm milk._ ”

“Warm milk?” Pacifica squinted.

“ _I asked him that, he’s typing…_ _Says that their naturally weird biology responds well to warm milk which helps their healing process. With a little milk, food, and rest, your little birbit should be good to go by the end of the week._ ” Dipper turned back to the camera, a hint of a smile. “ _Think you can handle that?_ ”

Pacifica took a deep breath.

“Yeah, I can handle that.”

“ _I_ _S THAT PAZZY?”_ Pacifica heard Mabel scream off-camera.

“I’ll talk to you later, Dip,” Pacifica said quickly, hanging up.

 

* * *

 

That’s how Pacifica found herself sneaking through the kitchen. She had managed to find a gallon of milk and poured enough of it into a small pot, set it on a stovetop, and turned the burner on. She was hiding behind a prep table while waiting for the milk to get warm.  
Of course, she didn’t realize that turning the burner to max was a bad idea. She also didn’t understand how fast milk could boil, and that boiling milk rises, foams, spills out of the pot, falls into the flame, and causes a whole host of problems including but not limited to: a sudden screeching sound from the hot metal, an excess of steam, a following excess of smoke, the sudden blaring of the smoke alarm, the triggering of the kitchen’s fire sprinklers, her mother happening to be in the kitchen checking on the cooks preparations for dinner that night, her mother screaming at the prospect of a fire, her mother screaming louder because the sprinklers had ruined her make-up and hair, and the sudden unemployment of one cook who caught the flack for apparently boiling milk too long while Pacifica had absconded back upstairs to her room.

When she tried again later that evening, after dinner, she took all this learned wisdom into account and instead only let the milk simmer at a low heat for a few minutes. Now, she faced the new issue of not having a place to put the milk to feed the birbit. She had already taken a bowl for water, which was still full and sitting in her room. Not wanting to risk anyone noticing more bowls missing than needed, Pacifica made her way into her mother’s private reading room. She didn’t venture very deep, for fear of encountering her mother. She went to a nearby shelf and took one of the baby bottles that her parents had saved from her youth and had bronzed. She tried to unscrew the top, only to discover that it was, in fact, bronzed. Realizing that the top would not be removed, she returned the bronzed bottle.

Instead, she ventured back into the attic. Deep in the attic, she was able to find a box of excess baby stuff. Her parents had spent their vast wealth on many, many objects for Pacifica when she was a baby. The bronzed bottle was simply the last bottle Pacifica ever used, which her parents felt the need to save. In reality, they purchased a new bottle every time Pacifica was fed, and simply handed the old bottle to the servants to dispose of. The same was true with nearly every toy she seemed to grow bored with. Lucky for her, not all of them were thrown away, some were simply thrown into storage. She found a collection of old teething rings, a bead maze, and a bottle. Even with the accumulated dust, she could tell that she needed to wash them.  
A sneaking trip to her personal bathroom was the solution to this issue. Juggling the teething rings, a bead maze, the bottle, and the pot of milk, she made extra sure that there were no eyes watching her as she made her way through the mansion. She made it to the bathroom and washed off the objects from the attic. Finally feeling a moment of success, she prepared to pour the milk into the clean bottle.  
It was at this moment that she suddenly remembered that the milk had, during the course of her travels, gotten cold again.

 

* * *

 

Pacifica had left the attic stuff behind in her room. She was in the kitchen again, warming the milk in the pot. It was when she rose up to click the burner off and retrieve the milk that she heard the _klik-klak_ of heels behind her.

“Pacifica?”

Pacifica shot around. “Mom!”

“What are you doing in the kitchen?”

“I, um, like, um,” Pacifica turned her attention to the pot of milk. “I came to get… a glass of warm milk.”

“And you came to get it yourself?” Priscilla pressed. “Why not get one of the servants?”

Pacifica was grabbing a drinking glass. “Well, I couldn’t find any servant so I just figured I’d-”

“Well we taught you to call indignantly into the servant’s quarters when you couldn’t find any, they can’t afford the luxury of sleep, you know that.”

“Mom, I just wanted some milk!” Pacifica snapped. Priscilla stood shocked. Pacifica found herself suddenly shaking and quickly poured the milk from the pot into the glass. It was possible that her mother was starting to say something, but Pacifica had already started quickly back towards her room.

 

* * *

 

Once she’d poured the contents into the bottle, the next challenge came with actually getting the birbit to drink. As she approached, the birbit shrunk further and further into its little cave. It eyed her warily. While she was away, it had taken a few drinks from the water bowl. But now that she was in the room again, it refused to emerge from its little hideaway.

Pacifica reached a hand out to it, which forced it to slink back. She sat on the floor and settled in. After a few minutes of trying, it finally leaned forward and took a tentative sniff of her hand. The little beast shrunk back into the nest. Next, Pacifica, begrudgingly, after getting over the stickiness she would have to deal with, dabbed some of the milk from the bottle onto her fingers before extending her hand to the birbit. A little longer now, but it came forward to sniff her hand again, this time licking the residue off the tips of her fingers.

Now, it made its way further out from beneath the blanket. Licking the milk residue up to Pacifica’s knuckles, moving from finger to finger. Pacifica brought the bottle close and, as it started to pull back, let a drop out onto the squishy bed. It stopped, sniffing the stain before licking at it. Now Pacifica brought the bottle to its mouth. After smelling it, it brought its mouth up to it and Pacifica squeezed the end of the bottle to feed it.

When it seemed satisfied, it licked at her fingers again before making its way into the makeshift cave, curling up, and sleeping.

 

* * *

 

The birbit warmed up to Pacifica progressively more over the next day. It was venturing out of the makeshift cave more and more. Pacifica had returned to the attic again and found a litter box and box of litter for it, in the same place as she’d found the cat bed. She wasn’t sure that she could teach it to use the box. But, at least it would be something to hide the smell and somewhere to put the mess after she cleaned it up, a process that took several or more minutes of quiet self-pep talks before doing it.

As the creature ventured further, it would willingly spend more time with Pacifica during the day. She hated having to lock it in her room while she made was out. But the birbit needed to remain so that she could save face with the family before they could suspect anything. But whenever she would open the door, it would hop around excitedly, spreading its quickly healing wings. Soon after, it would get as close to the window as it dared and stare out at the snow, clearly yearning to be anywhere except for locked in here.

She would smuggle up more warm milk and carrots to keep the little thing going. She’d learned her lessons and mercifully the days had gone by without any more incidents. Communications with Dipper helped her know how much she should and shouldn’t be feeding the little thing.

She could tell it was almost healed during one particular night. After she’d settled into bed, the sound of flapping wings filled the room. The birbit landed on Pacifica’s bed and flopped beside her to cuddle with her during the night.

She named it Carrie.

 

* * *

 

Pacifica decided that it was nearing time to release Carrie again. That, however, was the plan for tomorrow. Tonight, she was getting Carrie dinner. She was making her way back upstairs with the two carrots she’d plucked from the kitchen. It was all supposed to be very easy.

“Pacifica Elise Northwest,” Preston called.

Pacifica turned on the stairs to find her mother and father glaring impatiently up at her. She wanted to say something, but her voice was inexplicably caught against the spit at the back of her throat.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Preston said.

“Um, just going up to my room!”

“With carrots?” Priscilla wondered.

“Well I decided I wanted a snack.”

“You can’t eat that raw, dirt stick,” Preston declared. “You should have a cook chop and boil and plate it with a nice venison.”

“It’s fine, dad, I–”

“Your father is right, Pacifica. I’ll call a cook over and we can–”

The crunch filled the room, cutting Priscilla off. The Northwests shot their gaze up to their daughter. She had chomped straight through one of the carrots.

This was one of the worst decisions she had ever made, Pacifica decided immediately, it was bland and flavorless and yet disgusting and tasted simultaneously like dirt and the sour minerals of the earth reserved for the sustaining of the poor. Her taste buds were bored and also suddenly poisoned, she thought. But, this was for Carrie and she had already committed to this ruse.

So she chewed, gave her parents a nonchalant shrug. “I told you I just wanted a snack,” she choked out. And then turned around and rushed up to her room, ignoring the shouts of her parents, while trying not to puke.

 

* * *

 

Pacifica had managed to coerce Carrie onto the bed to eat. So the birbit was flopped over between Pacifica’s legs as it chomped away at the carrots. She pet the creature gently, and it responded with a collection of approving noises.

“I dunno, Carrie. What am I supposed to do once I let you go?”

The creature looked up at her, but simply nom’d away at its food.

“You’re so cute. I’m gonna miss–”

A noise from outside her room. Stomping up the stairs. She lifted Carrie gently aside and rushed to her door. She pressed her ear against the door while locking it. She heard shuffling just outside her room.

“Something is wrong with our daughter, I know that,” her father said.

“Oh, Preston, what do you think it is?” her mother added.

“She’s been acting strangely since she came home from the snow. I thought it was just the cold but I fear it’s worse. I fear she’s been getting involved with the _common folk_ and the _wilderness_.”

Priscilla gasped. “No!”

“I’m afraid it’s true. Ever since that incident with the party,” he trailed off. She could hear him digging through his pockets for something. “I must have left it in my study. Stay here, I’m going to get the butler to get me my bell.”

Pacifica could hear the footsteps as her father wandered away. A moment later, her mother knocked on the door.

“Pacifica?” Priscilla called.

But she wasn’t preparing to talk to her parents. She wouldn’t be on the other end of their lectures again. Or their lessons. Or their shouting. Or that bell. Or wait to find out what they might do to Carrie.

She had, however, been preparing for the possibility that they came to her door.

Pacifica was rushing now, and had no doubt that her mother could hear her frantic movements around her room. The knocking grew louder.

“Pacifica?” Priscilla called again. “Pacifica, open the door.

Pacifica grabbed her purse and her heaviest jacket. She changed quickly into a set of clothes she’d had prepared for this. With maximum effort, she pushed her smaller dresser in front of the door, and the knocking from the other side got louder as her mother no doubt heard the sound of the dresser scraping along the floor. Carrie just stayed on the bed, munching on carrots and watching.

“Pacifica! Open this door!” She could hear her mother messing with the door handle.

And she heard the footsteps again, her father now.

“What’s going on?” he said.

“She’s locked the door and she’s not answering me.”

She had her jacket on now. Her purse was wrapped around her torso. Her parents were slamming against the door.

She rushed to her bed and started throwing her many pillows at the door, just to add any kind of barricade to the dress. Once the pillows were off the bed, she grabbed her blankets and started tying the ends together. She’d been ready for the chance of escaping like this. She’d had Mabel help her over video calls. She could do it fast and get a makeshift rope made and make her way down to the ground. From there, she’d just make her way to town.

Carrie was shaken by the slamming and Pacifica’s increasing franticness. The birbit leaped off her bed and had taken to the roof of the bed. It was the first time Pacifica had seen her new friend properly fly.

She wanted to just stare at the birbit as it extended its wings out to their full span. As she heard the lock of her door starting to give way, she knew suddenly there was no time. She affixed the end of the blankets to her bed and called up to Carrie. She held out a final bite of carrot. Carrie floated down to Pacifica and rested on her arm. Pacifica gave the critter the bit of carrot. Opening her winter jacket half-way, she tucked Carrie inside with a reassuring “you’ll be safe in here.”

She threw her window open. She chucked the blanket rope out the window and stared down for a moment. It was a long way down, She had a moment of reconsideration. Then, as her door was slammed harder and her parents both shouted her name, she could hear the tingling of that bell.  
So, she grabbed onto the blanket rope and climbed onto the window sill. She inhaled the frozen air deeply, regretted it, and then followed through exactly as Mabel had taught her with a careful leap.

 

* * *

 

The snow broke her fall. To Pacifica’s credit, she had made it about halfway down the blankets. She had certainly practiced, but she had never really gotten the chance to test the strength of her knots on the side of the mansion while descending from several stories up. She was in a daze, unable to work up the energy to move anything after getting the wind knocked out her. She just stared up at the half-blanket rope hanging from her open window.

Her eyes went wide in panic as she bent her arm to check her jacket. Not finding Carrie, she turned her eyes skyward. Only to find Carrie on the ground, standing on its hawk-feet, staring down at her. A deeply relieved sigh escaped her lips. It was only now that she noticed the snow, slowly progressively covering her. She sat up, shook off the snow and the pain. The fall had not killed her, and she didn’t feel any lasting damage. But even with the days worth of packed snow, the fall had not done her any favors. She stood on wobbly legs.

“Come on, Carrie. Come on.” She whimpered out and started walking. Carrie hopped alongside her. As the snow continued to get deeper, Carrie started flying, but keeping close to Pacfiica. Pacifica, meanwhile, took to simply trudging and pushing. The snow had been her savior for sure, but she had never prepared to run away during an Oregon snow storm. Regardless, she ran.

 

* * *

 

Pacifica didn’t know how deep in the woods she’d ended up. Even though the storm had shifted into a light flurry, She was still trudging through deep snow. But, she knew the way to town and it was for sure close. Probably close. Maybe close. She was closer to town now, she knew, than she was before. More than likely.

She was deep now. The manor was completely out of sight by this point. Carrie continued to move nearby. Breathing deep, Pacifica made her way to a near-by tree and settled against it. The snow pants absorbed the moisture, but not the cold, as she sat in the snow. Her hooded head rested against the trunk.

Carrie landed nearby and hopped up to her.

She pulled her glove off and gently pet her birbit, knocking some of the snow from its fur and feathers.

“Good Carrie,” she sighed. “I’m tired.”

Carrie chirped.

“I’m just gonna breathe a second,” Pacifica huffed. She pointed out into the deeper woods. “You should go.”

Carrie followed her hand and then turned back to Pacifica and hopped towards her. The birbit rubbed its nose against her leg.

“You’re all healthy and fixed up, you need to get out of here.” She held a hand out and the birbit climbed onto her wrist. She pulled the animal close and pet it. “I’m gonna have to go back home eventually, so you’re gonna have to stay out here.”

It chittered.

Pacifica reached into her purse and produced one of her purple hair scrunchies. She wrapped it around Carrie’s leg. “I’ll look for you when I get back here.”

Carrie chittered again and licked at Pacifica’s hand. Pacifica brought it close and the animal brushed itself against her face. She held up a tube of lipstick, which it grabbed with its mouth. Then, she sent her hand skyward and the birbit spread its wings and soared into the nearby tree. Carrie settled, looked back down towards Pacifica, and then took off again.

Pacifica watched the cloudy sky for a while longer, wondering if Carrie would return. Once it became clear that Carrie was gone, Pacifica turned her eyes to the snow around her. She followed the line of her tracks from where she had come. She needed to figure out her next move. Make a decision about what happens now. Her first thought was simple, wait here for a while, or go into town, and then eventually go back to the manor. It was true and inevitable that she would have to go back and face the wrath of her parents.

Pacifica stumbled on the snow as she went to get up and tumbled into the cold powder. What she truly wanted was for the snow to stop. She just wanted to be in the sunlight again. She kicked the snow away as she rose up again. The snow came off her jacket after a few good hits and shakes.

She wasn’t going home. Struggling against the snow towards town, she decided that she was going to chase the sun.

 

* * *

 

She’d waited at the bus station overnight. The storm hadn’t returned with any fury yet, and wouldn’t until later in the evening this day.

A bus ticket to Piedmont was easily within her price range. It was annoying to not have a more extensive wardrobe, but she could afford a few more once she was with the Pines. Plus, she’d been unfashionable enough to wear Mabel’s clothes before, it wouldn’t be as much of a bother. The roads had been kept mostly clear, and the bus was preparing to get out before the next major part of the storm. Once it got over the pass and around the mountains, it would be clear all the way to the redwoods. From there, the trip to the bay area would be easy.

So there sat Pacifica Northwest, in the back of a greyhound bus about to leave Gravity Falls for Piedmont. She’d have to return. She knew that. The anger she’d face from her parents would be the same in intensity no matter how long it took her to get back. But, she had cash, so why not visit her friends? Let them worry and struggle in the snow for a little while.

She planned to call Dipper and Mabel when she was closer to the city. That way she could get their address _and_ they couldn’t say no. Until then, she would have to pass the time, pass the hours. A way would present itself, surely.

For now, she leaned her head against the bus window and stared out as the sun rose over the tree line. The bus started to lurch forward. As she gazed upward, she watched as a small birbit landed on a branch and stared down at her. She waved to her friend as the bus pulled out of the station.

**Author's Note:**

> Leave a comment, let me know what you hated and didn't hate as much.


End file.
